Winterizing water system

M

menos22

Member
May 26, 2009
165
Colonial Beach, VA
Boat Info
1994 Sea Ray 350 Express Bridge
Engines
Twin 454 Mercruiser With V-Drives
Just winterized my fresh water system, the old fashioned way. Drained system addded 6gals of Pink stuff turned on pump and did not see any pink at the faucets.. Hummmm. Guess what happened. I had put some bleach in the water system a while ago and apparently there was some left in the system. The bleach removed the pick color from the antifreeze so you could not tell when the pink was in the lines. Flushed system with fresh water, added more pink stuff and all was good. Passing this along just in case someone runs into this situation. Put a tiny bit of bleach into a container with some pink stuff and it turned clear. Just FYI.
 
Another option that some of us do involves blowing out the lines with compressed air. Saves the expense of the pink, but primarily avoids the spring time hassle of trying to get the pink back out of the system. They even sell a pre made adapter to connect your air compressor to the dock water inlet. Same concept works on the air conditioning units as well. One key note - make sure you get the water out of the pumps, or push a small bit of pink through them.
 
markrsimon said:
Another option that some of us do involves blowing out the lines with compressed air. Saves the expense of the pink, but primarily avoids the spring time hassle of trying to get the pink back out of the system. They even sell a pre made adapter to connect your air compressor to the dock water inlet. Same concept works on the air conditioning units as well. One key note - make sure you get the water out of the pumps, or push a small bit of pink through them.
Click to expand...
I too blow-out my water system so I don't have to dump all that pink stuff in my water tank and deal with flushing out the system in the spring. I made a jig to fit my dock side water inlet(quick connect) with a control valve on my air line to control the pressure. Good advice on the dealing with the pump though...wish I knew that 4 yeas ago.
I also made a jig for my A/C and Gen sea strainers and a separate one for my mains. It's an extra groco sea strainer cap tapped with a 3/4" hose fitting with pepcock to control the flow. Screw it on the sea strainer and the other end goes into a 5 gal bucket sitting on high on the deck filled with pink stuff. Turn on the A/C or gen and it sucks it through nicely.
 
Islandtime04 said:
I too blow-out my water system so I don't have to dump all that pink stuff in my water tank and deal with flushing out the system in the spring. I made a jig to fit my dock side water inlet(quick connect) with a control valve on my air line to control the pressure. Good advice on the dealing with the pump though...wish I knew that 4 yeas ago.
I also made a jig for my A/C and Gen sea strainers and a separate one for my mains. It's an extra groco sea strainer cap tapped with a 3/4" hose fitting with pepcock to control the flow. Screw it on the sea strainer and the other end goes into a 5 gal bucket sitting on high on the deck filled with pink stuff. Turn on the A/C or gen and it sucks it through nicely.
Click to expand...

this is what I do to winterize, works great. Can winterize the 2 engines, genny and 2 AC units in less than 1 hour
 
menos22 said:
Just winterized my fresh water system, the old fashioned way. Drained system addded 6gals of Pink stuff turned on pump and did not see any pink at the faucets.. Hummmm. Guess what happened. I had put some bleach in the water system a while ago and apparently there was some left in the system. The bleach removed the pick color from the antifreeze so you could not tell when the pink was in the lines. Flushed system with fresh water, added more pink stuff and all was good. Passing this along just in case someone runs into this situation. Put a tiny bit of bleach into a container with some pink stuff and it turned clear. Just FYI.
Click to expand...
I think I just learned a quick way to get rid of the pink in the spring!
 
I guess I over thought what I do. I put in a shark bite three way valve before the pump. After the water tank is completely drained I flip the valve and do the pink. I like to put the pink through the pump and strainer. In the spring it's 1 qt of bleach, fill the tank a third to half way and run empty then re-fill and I'm good. I blow the ice makers out with air, never pink the ice makers.
 
markrsimon said:
Another option that some of us do involves blowing out the lines with compressed air. Saves the expense of the pink, but primarily avoids the spring time hassle of trying to get the pink back out of the system. They even sell a pre made adapter to connect your air compressor to the dock water inlet. Same concept works on the air conditioning units as well. One key note - make sure you get the water out of the pumps, or push a small bit of pink through them.
Click to expand...
Thats what ive been doing for 17 years on my 340. Air compressor connected to shore water inlet, run fresh water tank dry, drain hw heater, then turn on air, keep turning stuff on and off, starting at furthest faucet, etc, till its just mist. Make sure you use enough pressure, 60 psi, to get the head bowl completely dry... or youll have a cracked one come spring.
 
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